Blanco y Colorado: Old Days among the Gauchos of UruguayTetley, William C.
History
Blanco y Colorado: Old Days among the Gauchos of Uruguay
Tetley, William C.
Uruguay -- Description and travel; Uruguay -- Social life and customs
the cattle going on regularly. On one of these occasions, I was riding
the "saino," we were rather short-handed, and a big point of cattle made
an attempt to break back. I had to put the "saino," therefore, into a
full gallop, and was rather surprised to find that he seemed to me to
have, when stretching himself out, quite a superior turn of speed. With
a little care and rest he had considerably improved, both in looks and
condition. One beautiful day, with a frosty air and a blue sky, I rode
him down to Monsieur Emile Gunther's, to ask after "Carnival." I found
him at home, and he kindly invited me to join them at breakfast.
Although it was the end of winter, the Swiss Colony looked attractive as
I rode through it, and this was doubtless due to the fact that the
numerous and large clumps of "eucalypti" never lost their summer
foliage. Monsieur Emile told me "Carnival" had kept well and safe from
soldiers. Moreover, when from time to time he had been good enough to
use him, as I had especially asked him to do, he had always found him a
very pleasant horse to ride. I sincerely thanked him for his kindness,
and, when I left, saddled up "Carnival," leading the "saino," who led
very well, and I arrived home with my two horses feeling that I had
greatly enjoyed my ride, and I am sure that "Napoleon" was glad to see
his friend again. One afternoon during Don Frederico's absence I had
been round the puestos, returning but a few minutes before sundown. The
southdowns were shut up inside their sheepyard, and in it was a man in
the act of catching hold of one of them. He was brandishing a large
knife, and loudly gesticulating, and he looked to me as if he had been
drinking too much Canya. It seems he had ridden up shortly before and
asked the Indians to give him some mutton to eat, as he said he had been
riding in the woods of the Pichinango, and that he was hungry, and
wanted food. This they offered to do, but when he saw the southdowns in
their yard he said he would have one of them, and when they remonstrated
and told him I should be very angry, merely remarked "that he did not
care for any Englishmen, whether he liked it or not. It did not matter
the least to him." As it happened, I just rode up at the critical
moment, when I at once jumped off my horse, went into the yard, and told
the man to come out of it, and leave the sheep alone. He made a step or
two forward, towards me, knife in hand, but I whipped out my Colts
revolver, and covered him with the barrel, warning him that if he came a
step forward I should fire. This calmed him down, and he put back his
knife into its sheath and began to walk out of the yard. I told him to
mount his horse at once, and clear out, and that if I found him again
interfering with any of the stock upon the estancia, it would be the
worse for him. So he rode away, looking very much subdued. I could only
suppose him to be one of the matreros who were still said to be hovering
about the woods in our neighbourhood.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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